Clytie
by Damnage
Summary: Her senses conjure up everything that was right. The money. The sex. The roses. The comfort. The ring. She can't help but give a weak, hopeless laugh as she wonders where everything went wrong ... Modern Day AU, prostitute!Glimmer, for Zoe.


**This one-shot is dedicated to _alliwantforchristmasisjordjord_****, who **_**literally**_** spoonfed me this idea. You are a flawless Queen (who needs to stop changing her penname).**

**TW: rape.**

* * *

_Clytie  
"Darling, Darling, doesn't have a problem,_

_Lying to herself 'cause her liquor's topshelf,_

_It's alarming, honestly, how charming she can be,_

_Fooling everyone, telling 'em she's having fun."_

—_Carmen_, Lana Del Rey

* * *

_the preface_;  
_she's still shining like lightning_

* * *

_Glimmer turns on her side on the ground, freezing and frustrated and fucked up. She is into some other spectrum of sensitivity where every sound is cut glass and the edges of her eyes are prisms. It takes all her willpower to get onto her back, her blonde tresses splaying all around her; a concrete angel._

_The footsteps are starting to wither away as her memories do the opposite. Her senses conjure up everything that was right._

_The money._

_The sex._

_The roses._

_The comfort._

_The ring._

_She can't help but give a weak, hopeless laugh as she wonders where everything went wrong ..._

* * *

_the story_;_  
baby's all dressed up with nowhere to go_

* * *

It's past midnight and the dark sky resembles ink spilled from a bottle. Headlights on a silver truck are the only source of light the night has to offer, and that beam will be gone as soon as Cashmere finishes her ministrations.

Bored, Glimmer leans against the brick wall and smoothens out her red dress. She should be wearing something heavier than the thin cotton given the stone-cold weather, but she has grown to tolerate the circumstances. Many people—her customers and co-workers alike—find it futile to dress up with nowhere to go. Why wear lipstick when it'll be smudged after your first John? Why wear heels that'll hurt your feet while a John, who won't give a shit about anything that's hurting you, fucks you into a mattress? Why wear a pretty dress when it'll only wind up being torn on a Motel floor?

The people who ask those questions, she thinks, don't have much respect for themselves.

Seneca would never let his workers wander the streets looking like just anything. They need to look riveting, need to represent him. They are now known as _Careers_ around the city; the ones who flaunt their profession. _We are harlots. We are drug addicts._ _We will not be overlooked._

Glimmer looks up when the truck door opens and Cashmere jumps down from it while she shoves cash into her bra. The vehicle takes off immediately; almost as if the driver expects a gunman to jump out and start shooting.

"First timer?" Glimmer asks.

Cashmere nods and stands next to her younger sister against the brick wall. "It's a slow night," she observes, taking out a cigarette and lighter.

"That's a nasty habit."

"You're one to talk." It takes Cashmere a moment to realize what she just said. "You know I didn't mean that."

Women become prostitutes for reasons. Society has yet to understand that a girl just doesn't wake up in the morning and decide that she wants to give strangers blowjobs for a living. They strut the streets at night with motive, with meaning. Some need money to go to college. Some need money to eat. Some, the overpowering majority, need money to fuel their addictions.

With Glimmer, it isn't _need_ as much as need_ed_.

An approaching BMW saves her from having to respond.

"So you're not going to tell me it's okay before you go?" Cashmere prompts. "You want me to feel like shit all night?"

"I have a customer to tend to," she winks.

The white, shiny BMW stops exactly where she goes to stand on the curb. The driver rolls down the window to drop the barrier between them. The shine from his headlights casts a faint light on what he looks like, so she gets a decent idea of who she's about to do business with. The male is pale, square-jawed, and spiky-haired. Normal.

A personal rule Cash and Glim have made between themselves is that they are not to perform acts with anyone who looks suspicious. The rule isn't always adhered to, as they sometimes (almost all the time) need the money. But this man passes as ordinary and Glimmer won't feel any shame in sleeping with him to get away from her sometimes-overbearing sister.

"I've got a hotel room at the Capitol." says the John-to-be.

This makes her eyes widen.

The Capitol Inn is an exquisite place, a five-star hotel that makes the constellations in the sky green with jealousy. Seneca has a suite there. Never has she been taken to a place other than a dusty Motel or a rat's alleyway.

"You can't be shy." continues the male, because she's visibly hesitating.

Blinking away the shock, she shakes her head and smirks. "Not at all," the blonde purrs. She makes her way around the vehicle to get into the passenger's side, avoiding eye contact with her older sibling. She climbs in and is instantly surrounded by the new-car scent. It mingles with a strong-scented cologne. It more-than beats having to put up with smelling cigarettes and filth.

Her business partner for the night starts to drive away. The Capitol Inn is across town, so she takes her heels off and tucks her feet beneath her body neatly. She might as well get comfortable and enjoy the ride. She sighs with contentment when the John turns the heater on.

Winter is always a harsh season for her and her sister. It involves them having to work in the dry-as-bone climate and giving one another cheap presents on Christmas day. Well, the gifts may be less than the cost of a blowjob, but they're priceless to Glimmer. It's the thought that counts, the feeling that _someone _cares.

Shit, now she feels bad for leaving her sister. She'll just give her a heartfelt apology later—and hopefully get one in return. It's what they do: give and take, tit for tat, back and forth. It means nothing and it means everything.

The Capitol Inn comes into view a while later. The hotel is cascaded in bright lights and advertisements and has more than one thousand feet of luxury. It resembles something extravagant in Las Vegas. _So you're definitely wealthy_, she thinks as she gives a sidelong glance at her current client. If she shows him a good time, he might pay a little extra.

She puts her heels back on.

The man pulls into a dimmer driveway where the hotel entrance is and rolls down the window. A car escort stands outside. "Your regular spot?" asks the valet, to which her John smiles and nods.

With that, he exits the car and she guesses that she is supposed to follow.

The hotel interior is ten times more stunning than the exterior. The lobby is very glamorous with glitzy chandeliers and polished marble floors. People who are dressed eccentrically lounge on the furniture and around the check-in counter.

She feels like she's in another world.

"This way," motions her John. The male leads them toward some elevators and presses the Up button. It doesn't take more than five seconds for one to arrive and glide open. He steps aside to let her get inside first and then follows in after. It's not until the elevator doors close that she gets the chance to actually study him.

_Normal_, as she deemed him earlier, isn't the right word at all to describe him. His mountainous form could be better described as _Godly_. His facial features are cold as ice, hard as stone. A black suit covers his presumably-muscular body. She wonders—with a genuine curiosity—what's underneath his classy getup.

Once off the elevator, she is ushered down a lengthy hallway. Her client provides a room key for the suite at the end of the corridor. "The bedroom's that way." he points.

The blonde walks into the massive room. The space overlooks a beautiful, fabricated view of the city through a floor-length window. Street lights and stars cascade the metropolis with luminescence and mellowness. But she sees through all the glamour. _In that Motel over there, someone is having sex with a dirty old man to buy food tomorrow. Oh, and over there—in the alleyway between that _beautiful _skyscraper and brick building covered in ivy—a prostitute is trembling with cold as she blows her pimp. Let's not forget about that street corner over there—where my sister is feeling like fucking shit._

This is as beautiful as life gets.

"Fascinating view, isn't it?" her customer says from somewhere behind her. She turns around to spot him taking off his tie by the polished dresser. He has placed some cash, all green and pretty, on the smooth tabletop. It's about that time where she starts to get into her business-mode.

"I do presume that you're talking about me." she meows, inching toward him.

This gets him to chuckle—a deep noise that sounds like thunder. He places his tie on the dresser and coils an arm around her waist when she is close enough. "Let's find out." he responds, finding her dress zipper and sliding it down her back. The dress falls into a rumpled mound on the floor around her feet, exposing her lace undergarments. She can spot a pleased expression flicker in the icy eyes across from her.

She kicks the red dress away and proceeds to strip off his clothing. His suit jacket and dress shirt are off and scattered on the floor in less than a minute—their stripping only interrupted by kisses to the jawline and neck. She takes a moment to admire his upper body: his biceps, abs, shoulders, and everything else that seems to be carved by a lumberjack. His milky skin wraps tautly around his intimidating muscles. She runs a fingernail down his chest before reaching up to trace his jawline with her tongue.

"You must work out," she murmurs into his skin.

"There's a gym here." he answers shortly.

With that, he turns her around and starts to back her toward the bed. She allows him the slight control until they make it to the bed. At that point, she turns their positions around and places a finger on his chest, pushing him back onto the king-sized mattress. "You don't control the pace, babe," she explains as she climbs atop him. "I do."

The John gives her a look that shows no disagreement.

She is the best in her profession for a reason. She gets more customers and business requests for a reason. She isn't that angst-ridden prostitute that doesn't bother smiling while she performs her talents. She isn't that lost harlot who has the audacity to cry while she gets fucked for money. She takes pride in her job. She has fun with it.

"What's your name, babe?" she asks, dipping down to brush her lips across his cheek.

"Cato." he states.

_Cato._

The name means so little right now, but she has not a clue how much impact it will carry later. She smirks into the smooth skin of his cheek.

She realizes that they are too covered—too clothed. Still smirking, she reaches between them to undo the button and zipper on his dark slacks. They fall into a black puddle on the bedroom floor moments later. She brushes her fingers teasingly over the tent in his dark boxers.

"If you want oral, you're going to need a rubber." she tells him, stroking him through his boxers. Her eyes glaze over him seductively, coaxing him to accept the sexual offer. It's not that she wants to do it, but she could use the extra money.

Without replying, he pats her thigh to silently tell her to get off him and reaches for the drawer handle on his nightstand. He pulls out a packaged condom and they get back into their positions—her on top, him laying beneath her.

She leans forward to take the condom between her teeth, her hands too busy pulling his boxers down. Once they are discarded, she rips the condom package open and rolls the protection onto him.

It's mere seconds later that her tongue dips down to run along his entire length. He is the biggest she's seen in a while, and definitely the most attractive. But these qualities don't separate him from the rest; a John is a John.

But he'll be more fun to please.

Slowly, she runs her wet tongue along his shaft again. She looks up to see that his hands are resting cozily beneath his head and his eyes are half-closed and focused on the ceiling. He looks as if he's about to be lulled to sleep.

That needs to change. He needs to be weaving his hand through her hair, begging her to fuck him with her mouth, screaming her name. Speaking of ...

"My name's Glimmer." she informs him, just so he can yell it out when he comes.

"I know."

This catches her off guard for a moment, but she shakes the slight shock off. Maybe she gave it to him earlier and forgot.

Her hand wraps around his base and her tongue flicks across his tip. Her hand clenches and unclenches around him as her mouth takes him in. He is extremely well-endowed, so her hand moves down to the part of him that can't fit into her mouth. Her tongue proceeds to move up and down his cock at a menacingly teasing pace, her tongue tip tracing curl-like patterns through the thin condom and onto his thick flesh.

This ropes his attention, seeing as he sits up on his elbows and watches her with lust-clouded eyes.

Her speed quickens only at his hand, as he soon grows impatient and weaves his fingers through her hair. The growing sexual hunger in the bedroom becomes evident as he guides her up and down his cock at a faster rhythm.

"I thought I said I controlled the pace." she says, her lips pulling away from his erection, though she runs her hand up and down it with hard tugs.

"Your pace was excruciatingly slow," he growls lowly.

Her hand tightens around him and she gropes him at a more pleasing speed.

"Better?" she asks innocently, thick eyelashes batting and mouth moving south again.

"Much." he grits out, and she can tell that he's refraining from just grabbing her hair and thrusting himself into her enticingly-wet mouth. This makes her smirk as she takes him into her mouth again, her full lips running up and down his massive length.

She pulls away when she senses his climax approaching, not wanting to ruin the condom just yet. Annoyance spills onto his features, but it quickly disappears when she starts to strip off her last pieces of clothing—her bra and panties. Her nipples harden at the touch of the cold air, drawing his undivided attention to her breasts. She pushes her chest out—which is highly unnecessary since she is largely satisfying in that area—as she climbs atop his lap, hovering her body teasingly over his desire.

His eyes shift from her bare breasts to her emerald irises. His blue orbs are squinted and tinged with keenness. Their eyes don't move anywhere else as he brings his hands onto her hips, and she fully expects him to end it all and finally just thrust up into her. She wouldn't stop him if he did; the dampness between her legs proves that she, too, has some excitement for this.

"You can do it, you know," she whispers. "You can take me."

The John doesn't need to be told twice.

His grasp on her wide hips tautens and he slams her body down onto his, filling her immediately as moans fill the air. He doesn't give her body time to adjust to his size, his body rocking needily into her tight walls.

Impatience is a mutual trait her clients share.

He lifts himself up so that his chest is flush against hers, their warm skin brushing together as he thrusts into her. She curls an arm around his neck and leans her head past his shoulder, focusing on the wall behind the bed. This is what she usually does; evens out her attention on something in the distance and lets her customer have his way. He'll come eventually; they always do—all hard and warm and screaming her name. Then she moves on to the next hundred.

Still, she grinds herself into his lap to meet his greedy rhythm. He is the most attractive John she's had in ages, and tomorrow—when she's blowing an old, married man with a bald head and crooked, yellow smile—she'll miss this man, this well-built man with—

"Fuck!" she chokes out in a sharp breath; Cato has angled himself a little differently inside her, but the difference is anything but _little_. It is a slight position change that is, somehow, earning un-fake moans from her lips. Her hips proceed to roll faster atop his thrusting body.

"Enjoying yourself?" he asks huskily, not pausing his movements.

"Not nearly as much as you are, babe." she grits out.

He chuckles again, but stops to focus all his attention on her body.

It's not long before his sloppy actions indicate his nearing climax. His breathing is becoming heavier—hers is, too—and his hands squeeze her hipbones mercilessly as he fucks her harder. She fists his hair as she grinds for glory.

It happens quickly, but not quietly; he's grating out his orgasm and she can't help but cry out with pleasure with him. His release is enough to provoke hers and, as she moans out in a desire-filled agony, she realizes that this doesn't make sense. It's not often that a John gets her off, almost as unusual as an endangered species.

It feels good to experience a real peak; one not staged to make her customer satisfied.

(It feels good to feel the weight of his cash in her hand three minutes later, too.)

* * *

It's freezing outside, but her dancing is keeping her warm.

A fellow harlot saved enough money to buy a car. They blast the music, open the doors, and turn Career Avenue into a strip club—a playground and exotic animal exhibit for passing customers. It's as close to a school dance as most of them will ever get.

Glimmer snaps her hips to the beat as she points to her sister and sings. "_You da one that I think about all day-ay-ay._"

Cashmere laughs and grabs her hips, joining in on the pop song. "_My love is your love; your love is mine._" A BMW comes to a slow halt on the sidewalk and this stops their girlish duet. "John Number Seven." It's barely past ten o'clock in the morning—the sky as cold as the weather. "It's my turn, isn't it?"

Glimmer is about to nod when she recognizes the vehicle and, more importantly, the John. His profile is unmistakable through the glass window she sees him through.

"I got this one." she volunteers, wetting her lips with her tongue.

"You don't have to."

"But I want to."

The conversation ends and she's already strutting toward the car, the street morphing into her very own runway. Excitement intensifies her every step. The window is rolled down by the time she gets to the car and she leans in, a hand on her hip.

"I see you were having fun." Cato greets her.

"Oh, so you've been watching me?" Her eyebrow levitates and she looks expectantly for his response.

"You're not hard to miss."

Usually, she is the one with the last word, the one with the flirtiest comebacks and most seductive sentences. But his response leaves her speechless, even lightly blushing.

The blonde gets into the passenger seat and kicks her flats off.

Their transaction goes by smoothly, pleasantly. He takes her back to his expensive hotel suite and they are magnets being pulled to the master bedroom, but their sexual encounter is anything but robotic. It's another chance meeting of dragging lips and ragged moans and talk as dirty as their sins. Her toes curl on the sheets and, just as quickly as she comes, she tells him how much he owes her.

"One hundred?" he repeats, getting up from the damp mattress.

A nod is all she has to respond with. It almost embarrasses her to name such a low price for her golden ministrations, but her charges had to go down due to conflicting prostitutes. This business is just as real as any other—just as competitive.

He walks over to where she stands by the dresser and places the cash in her palm, running a hand around the curve of her hip as she counts the money.

_Twenty, forty, sixty, eighty, one hundred … one hundred and twenty … one hundred and forty … one hundred and fifty?_

"It's getting cold outside," Cato says before she can react to his fifty-dollar tip. "You should buy a coat."

For the second time today, her cheeks warm with the sweetest red.

* * *

Two days later, she is shopping in Macy's with Cashmere.

As she sorts through a coat rack—they're all soft, supple, and On Sale—she smiles the realest smile she's had in years.

* * *

"What's got you so giddy?" Cashmere asks her one day in their shabby Motel room.

She smiles, shakes her head, and crushes a roach beneath her four-inch heel. Its guts, all white and gooey, might disgust her if she weren't so used to doing this. "What the Hell are you talking about?" she responds, picking up the squashed bug with some toilet paper. She disappears for a moment to flush it down the toilet and wash her hands with their cheap hand soap (the Motel doesn't provide toiletries).

"You've been smiling a lot lately and … Oh! You don't get pissed when I smoke, either." Cash adds.

The small apartment smells like a burning flat iron and looks like a hoarder's residence (it has no closet space, you see). It's no cleaner than the streets outside, but it's the only place that Glimmer can feel comfortable in. It's her home.

Her unkempt, dusty, roach-infested whore house.

(Somewhere beneath the loose floorboards, there are lines and packets of cocaine as white and whimsical as snow. Sometimes, she forgets that it's all there. Sometimes, she lies awake at night fighting the urge to tear the wooden flooring apart and relapse.)

"So you're complaining about me not complaining?" she shoots back, lifting an eyebrow.

"Well, no. It's just … not _you_."

She puts her hands on her hips and shrugs.

But she internally knows what's gotten her this girlish; not a _what_, but a _who_. She hasn't yet told her older sister about her handsome client and his amazing sex skills. She figures that now is probably the time to shed more light onto why she's not so irritable anymore, if that's the word to even describe her normal mood.

"Well, there's this guy—"

"This John." Cashmere corrects as she falls back onto her bed, already fed-up.

Glimmer narrows her emerald eyes. "A John who gave me the extra money to get the coat I bought the other day." she retorts.

"Was that before or after you blowed him?"

Before Cash can begin her _you-know-I-didn't-mean-that_ montage, Glim storms into the bathroom and slams the door behind her; Hell on heels. She flicks on the shower water when her sister starts pleading through the door, drowning out whatever apologetic words she might be spluttering out.

Cato gave her money to buy a coat. That's the most consideration a John's showed her in … forever.

He is different and her sister is wrong.

(Or so she believes.)

* * *

Midnight is not too far off when an old and screeching pickup truck pulls up to the corner. Glimmer wears a leather skirt that barely covers her ass and a matching top that stops just below her bra-line. The man in the truck smiles predatorily when she walks over to him, lust in his eyes and cigarette smoke between his missing teeth.

"What can I do for you, babe?" she asks seductively (she is excellent at hiding her internal disgust).

"I rented a room at the Motel 'round the corner." It's all he has to say, but she barely hears him over her rumbling stomach.

As tacky as her Motel room is, it costs as much money as a Holiday Inn suite. Cashmere buys high-priced cigarettes, too.

Glimmer gets into the truck and can't enjoy the ride—but she still strokes her current John through his worn jeans. A low, pleasure-filled growl rumbles continuously from his scratchy throat, and she wonders if it's the most repulsive noise she's ever heard in her life.

It doesn't take more than five minutes to get to his Motel dorm; the space is dirty and small, but she only notices the second man in the room.

"My buddy wants to join in. For a little extra."

Her stomach roars again and the second John starts to unbutton his plaid shirt.

Her fingers slide down into her skirt when she smirks: "Yeah, for a little extra."

* * *

Her body hurts all over that night, but she goes to Burger King and becomes his Queen. She bursts out into tears as she brings a cheeseburger to her lips, but at least she's not hungry anymore.

* * *

Tigris puts one leg before the other, the split in her dress rising to her mid-thigh. Tattoos and the weight of life—the weight of _this_ life—cover her otherwise-pale skin. Her Asian eyes squint at the darkness of the night. "Where's Cash?" she asks lamely. They both know where the blonde is, but talking seems to make the December air warmer.

"With a John." Glimmer answers, applying more red to her full lips. The shade matches her taupe dress.

_Sexy_ is the best word to describe her; _pretty_ being the worst. There is no ugly, no unattractive, no beautiful. Prostitutes aren't beautiful; they're bitchy, they're blunt, and they're broken—shattered pieces of a washed-up childhood and smeared make up.

Her dress ruffles in the sudden wind. Her heart longs for something.

A client.

A comfort.

A coat.

Her eyes shift to the tall, thin body beside her. Her pupils take in all the black, red, green, and gold ink—all the colors depicting Chinese letters, various quotes, and astrology symbols. Tigris may not have been made by Picasso, but she's an art nonetheless.

"How many do you have?" Glimmer asks, because talking equals warmth.

"You count and tell me." Tigris cackles humorlessly. "I've got more tattoos than dead presidents."

Dead presidents. It's a synonym for money in the prostitution industry.

They talk about tattoos for the next few minutes, but a BMW—white, shiny, and recognizable—interrupts their conversation. Glimmer takes one glance at the vehicle and decides that she doesn't mind. She puts her lipstick back into the inch-wide space in the brick wall, knowing that it won't be going anywhere unless someone wants her wrath. She smacks her blood-red lips together and flexes her numb fingers.

"See you soon, Glim."

She waves a goodbye over her shoulder, already halfway to the spot Cato has pulled up to on the curb. He rolls down the window and she bats her eyelashes under the moonlight.

"Back so soon?" she asks innocently, paradoxically. It feels as though an eternity has passed since their last meeting, but she won't let him know that it feels that way to her, that he pops into her mind at least _once_ every dragging day.

"Did you get a coat?" he ignores her greeting, worry furrowing his brow. "It's freezing out here. Get in the car."

"I got one; I just don't wear it all the time." she retorts as she circles around the vehicle and climbs into the passenger's side. _I got one; I just don't want my sister to _see_ that I wear it all the time. _The harlot feels as if she's telling a lie to a guardian, a parent. A father. But most daughters don't fuck their dads for money.

Her fib doesn't earn a verbal response from him; he just nods once and turns his attention toward driving. Figuring that they are heading to Capitol Inn again, she takes her sparkling heels off and tucks her feet beneath her worn body. It's been a long day.

Her eyes grow bored of the roads being eaten up beneath his tires, so she shifts her idle stare to his profile. His hair—spiky as thorns the last two times she was with him—is slicked back on his head tonight. The gel adds additional years to whatever age he might be, but he still looks to be in his mid-thirties. It makes him more professional, if that's even possible, as the suit he's constantly wearing gives him the aura of a wealthy CEO at some fine corporation.

For a moment, she appreciates his appearance. For a moment, the thought of a regular John—gray-eyed and cigarette-stained—plagues her mind. A shiver kisses down her spine, and she doesn't know if it's from disgust or from the cocaine withdrawals that she occasionally faces.

Cato puts his warm hand on the exposed skin of her upper leg, rubbing it.

"Cold?" he says, not shifting his gaze from the roads ahead.

A lazy smile plays across her maroon lips. "Cold-hearted."

"Cold-hearted," he repeats with a quiet chuckle. "No, you're a sweet girl."

"Am I?" she meows, a hand moving through the darkness and finding his inner-thigh. She caresses him through his black slacks, but he brushes her hand away when she tries to move further up. A pout forms on her lips.

"Tonight isn't going to be about me." he speaks the language of intrigue.

Her pout fades and her eyebrow lifts in curiosity, but he says no more. That's when she realizes that they aren't heading toward the Capitol Inn. The last surprise a John gave her ended in her participating in a threesome that she still tries to scrub off her skin.

Her hands clasp together in her lap so tightly that they turn white. Her eyes blink slowly, thoughtfully, in the darkness of the night.

In time, a subdivision entitled District Two comes in her perception. Cato provides a bar-coded card to get the iron gates to creak open. His BMW rolls through the entrance and moves past big, beautiful houses that are complimented by mowed lawns and dying flowers.

She almost admires all the withering rose gardens they pass by. They prove that even something broken can be beautiful.

The car ride ends at a light blue house, spacious and suave, on a dim and quiet street. Cato pulls into the concrete driveway and unplugs his key from the ignition. He leads the way to the front door, his keychain chiming in his right hand. He opens the locked door and lets her step inside first.

Warmth glazes over her cold body temperature, soothing every pore and reheating every bit of exposed flesh.

"I'll be right back. Feel free to make yourself comfortable." he tells her, gesturing toward a plush sofa that sojourns few feet away from a cackling fireplace. He disappears down a hallway and she settles down onto the carpet near the hearth, extending her hands out to its flickering flames.

Her pupils travel the living room, taking in all its fine pieces and expensive trinkets: the mahogany table sitting before the couch, the fake plants by the curtain-clothed windows, the artistic paintings hung in several different places, the flatscreen television covering almost an entire wall. Everything is in dark shades—browns, caramels, golds, and greens. It's finer than his master suite at the Capitol Inn.

He comes back into the anteroom moments later, but walks past her. Her eyes follow him into the kitchen. She watches him open some cabinets, watches him pull two wine glasses from one, watches him take a wine bottle from another. She watches him walk back into the living room, watches him place the glasses and bottle on the table, watches him turn back to her and extend his hand.

Her cheeks start burning as she takes it. No, this doesn't make sense at all.

"I hope you like Nightlock." he says, leading her over to the sofa.

"I've never tried it, to be honest." she admits lowly. He releases her hand once she's settled on the loveseat and starts to pour the deep purple drink into the two crystal-clear glasses. It waterfalls from the bottle in inkish rivers. It's only when he hands her her glass that she realizes how much she misses drinking.

"It's incredible." he assures her, sitting down beside her.

She doesn't need to be told twice. She brings the rim up to her lips and allows the alcohol to flow down her throat. Her lipstick leaves an imprint on the glass—too red and perfectly-shaped to be considered a stain. Despite his own claim, Cato sets his glass down without even sipping from it. Instead, he brings his lips to her neck and sucks on the sensitive skin, tucking her blonde hair behind her ear in the process.

She laughs awkwardly and pulls away from him.

"What are you doing?" she lifts an eyebrow and eyes him suspiciously.

"Admiring a beautiful woman."

"A beautiful prostitute." It's something that her sister might say, but fitting.

"You're still a woman," he retorts, and she sees his eyes drop, almost as if he's looking down at the cleavage her dress provides, which he probably is, "and a beautiful one, at that."

That's when she realizes that he is dangerously different, dangerously outspoken with so little words that carry so much weight and dangerously close to pulling her into a butterflied and starry-skied high that only school girls feel, that only that pretty white powder made her feel, dangerously close to capturing her lips with his own and she's falling, falling, the high washing over her senses …

"Why are you so nice to me?" Their foreheads are pressed together and her lips brush his when she asks the question, her eyes clouded with a sleepy confusion as he weaves his hand through her hair again.

"Why not be?" His lips brush hers now. "You're a person. You have feelings and emotions. Desires."

She nods against his forehead even though she's still confused, kisses him even though she's still confused.

But she figures that this doesn't mean a thing. She'll still ask him for his money when their encounter comes to an end, still have to take a cab back to her Motel. Still think about him tomorrow, still run her fingers along her most intimate and overused parts as she pictures his physique in a quick shower.

She shifts on the couch, straddling his lap as they continue to explore one another. His hand travels along her leg, up her dress, along her inner-thigh. His thumb runs along her sex, teasing her through her lingerie, and she lets out a low gasp. He repeats the motion (she repeats the sound) before placing both hands on her hips and standing, lifting her up with him.

They are stumbling, kissing, touching, and she feels herself being pressed against a wall.

"I think about you a lot. Too much." he growls against her lips.

Her legs are tight around his waist. She can feel his bodily heat—his bodily desire—through his suit and all she wants from him right now is bodily bliss. But she swallows down her hunger to play his game.

"What do you think about?" They are so close together that her eyelashes stroke his when she bats them. "Slamming your thick, hard cock into me, babe? Wrapping your hand around my neck while you fuck me?"

He hesitates before shaking his head.

"I think about giving your body the attention it deserves. Tracing your collarbone with my mouth. Moving down to your lovely breasts. Circling my tongue around your nipples, giving each one the proper attention before moving down again."

Romance is a language she's unfamiliar with; it makes her throat go dry and her body pang with an aching lust. It makes her want more.

"Oh, and where would you be going?" she asks huskily, two short breaths away from begging him to continue his dialect.

"Between your legs." he says simply. "I think about slipping my tongue inside you—slowly at first, testing the waters. Tasting them. I think about teasing you the way you tease me, lapping at you at my own pace …"

Suddenly, she wants all their clothes _off_.

"After that?" she prompts breathlessly.

"I'd drive my tongue inside you until you were grinding into my face, your hand fisting my hair, screaming for me to get you off. I can do that. Do you want me to do that?"

His eyes dare her to say yes. A challenge was never something she backed down from.

Her head has barely nodded when she feels herself being pulled away from the wall and carried down a hallway. In between being brought into a candle-lit bedroom and placed on a rose petal-adorned bed, her clothing articles are falling off and being inevitably forgotten. Her right heel makes a loud noise against the hallway floor; the left on the carpet-covered bedroom. Cato takes off his excruciatingly annoying garments as she waits on the king-sized mattress, about to take her dress off herself. But she leaves the deed to him, too eager to feel his fingers brush her skin to take the gown off herself.

Only in his black slacks, he climbs atop her with a predator and prey-resembling demeanor that only excites her more. Their lips meet again in another heated kiss before he pulls away and takes all her clothes off. He runs his mouth along her collarbone as he promised. Moves down to her breasts as he promised, her nipples hardening at the touch of his tongue. She pulls her bottom lip into her front teeth as he kisses her most complimented assets—the ones that her Johns always drool at, always cup as they shove their cigar-stained tongues into her mouth—and can't help but let out an impatient mewl. She wants him to continue his talents, to move south one more time, to—_oh, fuck, that feels good_—give attention to that unusual and unbearable throbbing between her legs.

He bites into her nipple in response to her moan and she can almost feel his smirk.

"Has anyone ever done this for you?" His mouth is moving down again and that ache between her legs intensifies.

"They're paying me for what I do for them, not the other way around." her voice comes out hoarse.

"I don't see"—kisses down her stomach, his tongue circles around her naval—"how they could resist."

Her hands fist the bedsheets when she feels his breath above her sex. Her legs curl around his neck as he closes in the space between his mouth and her needy bundle of nerves. He runs his tongue along her clit and she wonders where this has been all her life, where _he_ has been all her life.

He slips his tongue inside her, twisting one way and then the other, sending a sensation through her writhing body that she's never felt before. She feels him smirk into her center.

He's a cocky bastard. Dare she say _her_ cocky bastard.

No. Cato is still a John, still a ravenous soul who pays her to suck his dick and make him come. But that favor is usually never returned, never given any attention to. He seems to think that this is normal, that she deserves this pleasure, that everyone should treat her as the normal woman she isn't and it confuses her to the core that he's currently licking at. _Fuck_, it feels good.

His breathing is heavy on her skin as he pulls away to locate her clit again, sucking on it and nipping sensually. A soft cry escapes from her throat and her body arches at the intoxicating touch. His hands instantly come up and grasp her hips, forcing her back down onto the mattress.

"Stay still." he growls lowly.

With a frustrated noise, she complies as he continues to work on her building climax. She can feel his enjoyment for the power he has over her. It doesn't take much longer for that power to become too much for her to handle. She shrieks out his name in a sharp request for him to just get her off already and he fulfills, latching onto her clit and giving one final, powerful tug.

A string of _fuck_s pour from her lips as he drinks her in, her hands holding the bedsheets so tightly that they wrinkle. She releases her grip on them when he pulls away from her, a thoughtful look in his eyes as he runs his tongue along his bottom lip.

"I told you that you were a sweet girl." His mouth is on her neck again.

A blush spreads across her cheeks in the almost-darkness and her eyes are starting to flutter shut as he continues to kiss her, peppering her jawline and—

It stops.

All the attention, touches, skin-to-skin connections; they are broken off when he settles onto the bed space beside her.

"Tired so soon?" she coos, climbing atop him with pouted lips. "We didn't even get started yet, babe."

She nips at his earlobe and itches for a response, far from done with their encounter. She feels his palm grasp her thigh.

"I don't want tonight to be about me." he repeats his line from earlier and it makes her eyes roll.

She pulls away from his ear and looks down at him with a childlike impatience. The incandescent candlelight in the room reflects off her emerald irises dangerously and she wets her lips with her tongue. "Well, what _do_ you want tonight to be about?" she retorts. "Getting me off? I certainly wouldn't mind doing that again."

Chuckling, he sits up so that his chest is flush against hers—skin to skin.

"Well, if that's what you want," his eyes are just as ablaze as hers, "yes. But if you'd rather just lay down and relax, then feel free."

Confusion sprinkles its daze over her again.

"So you brought me all the way here to not fuck you?"

"I brought you here to give yourself a break. I know that you do this a lot and don't get much time for yourself. I just wanted to take you away from that life—if only for a night. Will you let me do that?"

This is a proposal that she hasn't heard in years. One that offers hope, a better life, a hypnotic and shatterproof bond that'll end only when she does. Seneca talked to her in this way just months before he pushed her onto a street corner in only undergarments, using her body as a last resort to support their cocaine addiction. Back then, thinking about him would ignite a fire within her body, a hatred within her heavy heart. But he has brought her so far—too far to fall for a man's mouth again.

"I'm a whore who'll let you do whatever you want. But you want me to take a break."

She takes deep, purposeful breaths to brush her hardened nipples against his chest. He'll give in; they always do. The night will end with him throwing a dirty condom away and handing her the money he owes.

"I want you to stop defiling yourself first." His hand finds her neck and squeezes; not hard, not threatening, but enticing, making that throb between her legs return. "You aren't a whore by choice. You're one because you need to be _something_ to survive, even if it is something that damages you from the inside out. Whether you want to admit it or not, you're worth more than the quick fuck you offer. I've seen you with your sister before, the way you smile and laugh a lot when you're with her. The ice cube act isn't working too well for you."

Her throat goes dry. He has been watching her, watching Cashmere, cracking through her armor.

"Since when did you become such a preacher?" she manages.

His hand is still around her throat when he says, "When I found something to preach about."

* * *

They fuck five minutes later, slow and pulsing and the candles burning around them, but only at her desperate request.

(The catch: when she comes, she doesn't go. He asks her to stay with him, offers her something to eat, to drink, handing her a television remote in a frantic attempt to get her to stay a little while longer and she does. She stays with her head on his bare, damp chest and doesn't think about asking him to pay her.)

* * *

Her eyes flutter open when a wonderful scent fills her nostrils. A smile spreads across her lips and she stretches in the big, empty bed. Cato is making grilled cheese sandwiches. _"The finer things in life,"_ he had declared the first time he made them for her, which was only a few days ago. One bite from one proved that he was right—all crispy, perfectly-buttered bread and melted cheese; Heaven slipping down her throat. He puts tomato slices and bacon bits in his, but hers are always just good and old-fashioned. She wouldn't have them any other way.

She jumps down from the bed as an excited child would do on Christmas morning.

Christmas. The holiday is approaching in less than a week. He promised her that he'd get her sister a nice gift she could give to her. But that can wait.

The green nightgown he provided her with squeezes around her hips snugly as she walks to the kitchen, one foot before the other and a hand on her hip. The blonde stands in the doorframe as she watches him tend to the frying pan atop the stove. The kitchen isn't his natural habitat, but a place that he can habituate himself in nonetheless. It takes him a few moments to realize that he's being watched.

"Oh, Sleeping Beauty, you're awake." he greets, putting a finished sandwich onto a plate for her. "You were snoring."

"I was not." she shoves him playfully before taking the plate and settling at the kitchen table.

It's been seven days. Seven days since he asked her to stay and she still hasn't left him. A week filled with sweet whispers and grilled cheese and kisses down her body and cheesecake for desert. A week filled with promises made and hot bubble baths and promises kept and his tongue curling inside her.

It has to end today, but she doesn't want it to.

She decides that she's done with her breakfast even though she's taken just a single bite from it. She gets up from the table, leaving the grilled cheese to get cold, and walks up from behind him. She wraps her arms around his torso and presses her head against his bare back. His back is perhaps the most mesmerizing thing about him; it's as broad as a painting and just as muscular as the rest of his body. Last night, as he lay on his chest sleeping, she traced so many lazy patterns into his skin that she could've created a finger-painting.

"I have to go back home today, babe. Make sure my apartment is intact, you know? I wish I didn't have to."

"No, I understand." he assures her. "I'm going to miss waking up to your lovely snoring, though."

She stomps on his foot with her own and uncoils her arms from around him to slap him. Chuckling, he turns around and puts his hands on her hips.

"Hey, at least I called it lovely." he says, his lips brushing along her hairline.

"Yeah, I bet it's music to your ears, babe."

"You know what else is music to my ears?" Without warning, he lifts her off the tiled floor and places her on the marble counter.

He closes his mouth around hers before she can respond, gradually parting her lips with his tongue. His hand snakes up her head and his fingers thread through her bedraggled hair as he tilts their heads, allowing the kiss to deepen. She feels his other hand slip up her nightgown and she moans at the sudden presence beneath her dress.

"That's it." he husks, finger flickering at her scantily-clad clit. "It drives me crazy when you make those sounds when I do this."

"It drives me crazy when you do that." she breathes back, spreading her legs as far apart as her tight nightgown allows. The movement is pointless, though, as he pulls his hand back to himself anyway.

He presses his forehead against hers and takes a deep inhale. "When are you coming back?"

"I don't know. Next time we run into each other, I guess."

He hesitates before nodding in agreement. A faint smile ghosts onto her lips at the thought that he still doesn't want her to go.

When the time comes, he gives her a ride all the way back to her Motel, refusing to allow her to take a taxi or bus. She watches his hands grip the steering wheel as he drives, knowing that she'll miss them once some John with dirt-stained fingers and nails as yellow as his teeth manhandles her onto his mattress, gripping and squeezing and taking. She realizes—with a humorless irony—that this is the longest she's been without fucking a married man for food, for money, for her apartment's rent. She wonders how smoothly she'll adapt back into the lifestyle.

Her Motel comes into view in too short a time. Dread mingled in with annoyance fills within her as Cato pulls into a parking spot in the almost-vacant lot. He turns to her with eyes that are so emotion-filled that she can't even read them. They could be angry, regretful, disappointed, irritated. He blinks and all those sentiments digress into an impassive expression.

She leans over toward him and kisses him, unable to contain the temptation. He grasps her nape and their eyes lock when she pulls away.

"Don't forget about what I told you." The command isn't specified, but the extra details aren't needed; they both know which conversation he is referring to.

"I won't." she whines in a tone that would suggest that he was her father and he just told her not to do something she is going to inevitably do.

A half-smile pulls at his lips.

"See you soon."

"I hope so, babe." she kisses him one last time.

Her taupe dress quivers in the wind as she walks to the entrance doors. She wonders if he's watching her go.

The stench of cigars smacks her with a force stronger than the chilling wind. The lobby is occupied with tacky furniture, paint peeling off the walls, and a sleeping desk man_. Home sweet home._ The elevator takes forever to arrive so she resorts to the stairs—something she is too accustomed to to complain about. With each step she takes, she knows that she's making another mistake. Climbing closer and closer to judgment, to Cashmere.

They haven't spoken in a week. Glimmer is sure to get shit for that.

Her room key is barely in the lock when the door swings open, a gust of wind blowing her blonde hair around her face.

"_Where were you?_" Her sister has an unlit cigarette wedged between her lips, a black robe on her otherwise-nude body, and a tone that could make a pitbull recoil.

"Glad to see you, too." Glimmer pats her cheek lovingly and ducks under her arm to get inside the dorm.

"Don't get smart with me, Glimmer." Cash uses her unabbreviated first name, confirming that her wrath is about to explode. "Where the fuck have you been?"

"It doesn't matter; I'm back now. I'm fine."

"Yeah, I see that _you're_ fine," the words are spat, "but you have no idea how the fuck I was while you were away. I had to work fucking double-time because you disappeared off the face of the fucking Earth! I didn't even have the time to worry about you in between sucking dick and freezing my ass off in the streets. What the fuck is wrong with you, Glimmer?"

_Shit_, she thinks as her heart fills with something dark and gloomy. Her entire expression morphs as she turns around to meet her sister's fuming gaze. She hadn't even considered who her other Johns would turn to while she was away. It's just been a week, nothing too bad could have happened … But—in this business—you can be clientless one day and be having a rough threesome for food the next. Her lips pull back into an apologetic frown.

"Cash, I didn't—"

"You know how I'm always trying to apologize to you, but you interrupt me or storm off?" her older sister cuts her short. "Well, now it's your turn. Shut up and listen to me."

Shit, shit, shit.

"This last week has been Hell for me. I thought you were _dead_—Tigris, too; she was the last one who you were with ... Fuck, are you stupid? Where were you?"

"Well, I-I was—Cash, you wouldn't understand, okay?"

Cashmere squints her eyelids into slits, her sapphire irises just barely peeking out in between; a blue fire about to ignite. "You were with that John, weren't you?"

"Cash, he's not—"

"Not, what? Not a bad guy? Not a _John_? He pays you to fucking get him off!"

"You don't know that! You wouldn't even listen when I tried to tell you about him! Stop being so closed-minded and accept the fact that I found someone."

"You found someone." Cashmere scoffs, lighting the cigarette between her lips and taking a quick drag. "What's his last name?"

Glimmer tosses her hands up in exhaustion because it's a ridiculous question—a ridiculous question that she doesn't know the answer to.

"How old is he?" her sister continues, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Those things don't mean any—"

"But I bet you know how big his cock is, don't you? I bet you know what turns him on. I bet you know exactly what he—"

"Shut the _fuck_ up, Cashmere, okay? Shut up! You're being such a bitch. You're talking to me as if I'm your worst fucking enemy. We're _family_. I'm your little fucking sister!" Glimmer screeches, finally losing her patience and allowing her alter ego to take over.

"But you didn't think about that when you were with him, did you? You didn't think about the fact that you're my little sister and you were gone and no one knew if you were dead or not. You didn't think about the fact that I've been crying myself to sleep at night just to wake up three hours later to fuck your clients. No, you didn't think, because you _don't_ think."

"So you're calling me brainless." It's more a statement than a query.

"I'm not calling you Einstein."

"It's funny that you went through this same situation and I never judged you. I never asked where you were or cursed at you. I never degraded you. But I could have."

"You think I'm enjoying this? I want to save you from it, from him!"

"How can you save me from someone who isn't hurting me?" Glimmer lowers her tone even though she's internally screaming. The man—no, the _monster_—her sister describes is not her Cato, not the man she's been waking up beside every morning, not the man who's been giving her bubble baths every night, not the man who's been whispering sweet somethings into her ear before trailing kisses down her body and making her finally feel alive.

"Glimmer," Cashmere dabs her cigarette out on a nearby ashtray, visibly trying to swallow down her antagonism, "I just … Fuck! I don't want you to make the same mistakes I did, so hear me out, okay?"

"I've heard everything you had to say and it just doesn't apply to us. I know what I'm getting myself into with him, Cashmere, I'm not a child anymore. We haven't been children in forever."

"We've never been kids."

Glimmer frowns and her eyes pool with something watery. "You're right," she takes a step toward her older sister. "We're big girls with big girl decisions to make, and we need to stop fighting with one another. We're already fighting against these roaches and sex-crazed Johns, why add more trouble to that?"

Cashmere rolls her eyes but can't fight the smile that plays across her lips. Without warning, she grabs Glimmer and pulls her into a tight hug.

"You make me feel like shit a lot, you know."

"It's a second job for me."

"But still," Cashmere pulls away from the embrace and maintains a serious stare, "I want you to be careful."

"I will be." she promises despite the fact that she feels no reason to.

The more she thinks about Cato, about his words, about his promises, the more she realizes how unnecessary these warning are. She was with him an entire week and this was only known between them and them alone; if he wanted to hurt her, to harm her in any way, he had more than several chances to do so.

He is _still_ different and her sister is _still_ wrong.

(Or so she _still_ believes.)

* * *

On Christmas Eve, the night is crisp and not a single star is sprinkled across the sky. It's a slow night, but she doesn't expect it to be any different. Johns don't hook up with prostitutes because they don't have anyone else to turn to; they have children, girlfriends, wives, families. They turn to their chosen harlots because their wives won't do this, won't do that, because they had a long day and need a quick fix, because they want to feel pleasure, want to feel _power_. Flakes of snow begin to float down from the sky and she wishes that someone would stop wrapping gifts with their family to come and take her to a dirty (but warm) Motel room.

But at least she's wearing a coat. She hasn't been leaving her one-star hotel without it.

An aeon and a few wishes later, her knight in shining armor in the form of a white BMW arrives. A numb smile spreads across her lips as she approaches the vehicle.

"I'm so glad you're here. It's fucking freezing outside." she says, climbing into the passenger's seat and grabbing her seatbelt.

"Marry me."

The sentence is so sudden, so stunning, that she flinches back and releases her seatbelt. It makes a loud noise against her seat as it elastically retracts back into its place. She stares at Cato for an eternity, his blue-eyed gaze looking right back at her with an intensity only seen in Oscar-winning actors, before bursting out into laughter.

"Holy fuck, babe, that's a good one." she applauds.

He doesn't reply. Her heartbeat starts to increase its pace as her laughs come to an end. Her hair creates a curtain around her face as she looks up at him with eyes that are almost afraid. He hasn't moved a muscle since his initial greeting; if she didn't hear his soft breaths, she would believe that the weather froze them in the moment.

"Are you—"

"I want you to marry me."

He slides something cold and heavy onto her finger. She didn't even realize he grabbed her hand.

Her eyes drop down to the ring her finger has looped through. The band is silver and shining, the actual rock on it trapezoid-shaped diamonds that shine just as bright as her name does. Even in the dark, it's golden.

"I ... I-I ..." There's that confusion again; the bewilderment that numbs her senses and leaves her mouth agape. Her eyelashes blink a million times per second, trying to either bat away the daze or take it in with all its mathish complexity. "I don't know what to say."

"I don't want you selling yourself anymore. I don't want you worrying about when you're going to get the money to eat dinner. I don't want you worrying about paying the rent for your Motel room. You deserve better than this life." He brings a hand to hold her chin affectionately, never breaking their fixed stare on one another. "All you have to say is yes."

"Cato, this ring—"

"Is nothing," he finishes for her. "I mean, it was nothing for me to buy for you. There's plenty more where that came from."

A thousand words mix in her mouth, but she is unable to disjoin the many letters to form them into something coherent. Her lips stay in the _O_ shape they're in and her eyes remain on his.

"Babe ... I-I need more—"

"Time?" he nods in agreement. "Do you know where District Twelve Park is?"

"Well, yeah ..."

"Meet me there tonight"—he checks the time on his watch—"at midnight. You can give me your answer then."

Two hours is how much time she has to decide between two simple words.

Yes. No.

_Yes_ would undoubtedly equal a better life; one heaped with wealth and riches that solely exist in her wildest dreams. But an emotion inside her swelling heart tells her that accepting his request won't just bring her fortune. It'll bring laughter, it'll bring lightheartedness. It'll bring love. Once, she thought that she could fall in love with someone, be lulled into the fantasy that is giving and not taking, loving and not lusting. Of course, that was before she was tugged deep into the life that is fucking and not feeling, snorting and not sleeping. Perhaps this is the second chance that dreamers always talk about.

Or perhaps marrying Cato could turn out to be a mistake, which brings her to her other option. _No_ would mean that she wouldn't upset her sister. It would further mean that she would have to continue getting beady-eyed, weather-stained men off for a living.

"Okay," her voice is barely above a trembling whisper, "see you at midnight."

* * *

The District Twelve Park is always trim and gorgeous—the peridot trees stretch for endless miles, creating a canopy against the daytime sun for devoted joggers. Go one way and there's a pool, go the other way and there's a playground. Turn this way and there's a gymnasium, turn that way and there's a track field. The people working in the park are sure to keep it green and clean; snipping ungroomed bushes into tidy thickets of shamrock, picking up and recycling all litter from careless exercisers, growing vivid flowerbeds here and there.

Christmastime only amplifies the plaza's charm; bright lights are hung strategically in trees, but most are on the ground in the form of reindeer and candycanes, and one gigantic Christmas tree shoots up into the air from the middle of the area.

Glimmer smiles at the fact that she's going to get engaged here.

Her legs shake as she sits down on a bench near the main entrance. It's either the cold or her excitement that's got her on edge.

_A lifetime_, she thinks, _with soft breaths and Nightlock wine and beating hearts and hangovers in the morning. A lifetime with pretty things and scented candles and lingerie and their silhouettes against the bedroom wall. A lifetime with his body and his intrigue and his cerulean eyes and his_ everything_—all hers._

In the distance, Church bells ring. The choir is getting ready to sing their Christmas hymns. The night is freezing, but flawless.

A sudden and masculine chortle alerts her that she is not alone. Her eyes brighten up and dart toward the sound, looking for Cato, but she finds more than just him. With her fiancé-to-be are five other men; all dressed in suits, chuckling, and carrying beer bottles. Most walk with a stumble that was doubtlessly caused by the half-empty beverages they hold in their hands. As they come closer, she squints her eyes as if they're actually moving farther away. The one on the farthest right, the one with the tall and lanky build, he looks ... familiar. The one with the bald head, too—wait, that's got to be ... No. There's no way that she knows these additional men. They are faceless and blank in her memory.

"This is always my favorite part." Cato nudges his friend. He approaches her and she stands to meet him, a faint smile ghosting across her lips.

"Babe, I have my answer." she takes his free hand, attempting to ignore the third parties in the conversation. But their eyes are on her, drinking her in, intruding in on their privacy.

"Ah, about that ..." his breath is tinted with alcohol, "... we might have to put the wedding on hold."

She has a certain intuition that serves as a sixth sense to her. All prostitutes have this special talent; when you get into strangers' cars for a living—running your hands along their ripped jeans and slipping your fingers into their boxers—you need to know who to do business with and who to simply turn away from. You need to know when you're safe and when you're in danger.

Right now, she isn't sure which she might be.

"Babe," she squeezes his hand, "who are all your friends?"

This gets them all to start chuckling again, swigging from their beers and shifting their feet in an almost impatient manner, which begs the question: what are they waiting for?

"What, you don't recognize them?" Cato brings his thumb to stroke her cheek, but his hand moves down to her chin as he continues: "They sure remember you." He abruptly clasps her chin and _forces_ her to look at them, leering her face forward. The sudden motion urges a shocked gasp from her lips and her heart lurches in her chest. "You've fucked them all, darling."

Her breath catches in her throat. That's why they look so familiar. Each former John her pupils land on is another horrid memory that revisits her head. _He_ liked gyrating lap dances that made her legs cramp, _he_ liked his rough fingers around her throat as he pounded into her from behind, _he_ liked using his video camera, _he_ liked thrusting into her mouth with little to no restraint, _he_ liked pulling on her hair, yanking so violently that some strands fell out. These are the beasts that her sister should be protecting her from.

She takes a stumbling step forward, but Cato seizes her arms and halts her from continuing. He shakes his head as if to tell her no and gives a low laugh.

"Where are you going?" he interrogates. "Trying to leave me? I'm your babe, remember?"

"I'm her babe, too!" whistles one man. The others follow in with the same claim, clinking their Bud Lights together as they guffaw. But they start to inch forward, Cato is pushing her backward, and in moments she finds herself surrounded on the iron bench.

"I-I don't—"

"Understand?" he supplies. "That's reasonable. I mean, you didn't even get through high school; of course you don't understand. But I will give you one thing: you sure know how to fuck."

She has no idea what to respond with, so she just stares at him with disbelief in her eyes. This isn't _her_ cocky bastard, isn't the man who made her grilled cheese sandwiches and begged her to stay with him, isn't the man who sprinkled rose petals on her naked body and murmured into her ear that she was beautiful, isn't the man that gave her a fifty-dollar tip once and asked her to marry him. The alcohol turns him into mutation that she refuses to recognize.

"You see, princess," he throws his empty bottle onto the ground and it shatters into a million pieces, "you are the prize horse in the stable. The diamond among the coals. The most talked about starlet of the ring."

"The ring?" she trembles.

"The human-trafficking ring you're apart of;"—he smiles a vulturine smile—"the one run by me."

It's snowing outside, but sweat is starting to bead on her forehead.

"You see, these bastards kept complimenting you, telling me how _good_ you were, how _beautiful_ you were." he motions to the men behind him and they nod in agreement. "I just needed to see how delusional they were being, but not at all. You truly were the best to fuck. Best to manipulate. Easiest to manipulate, actually."

"So we're not getting married."

They all burst out into laughter and her heart drops. It's the first time its ever done that—she doesn't like it; it hurts too much.

"Of course not. After tonight, we're not even going to be seeing one another. I've gotten what I wanted from you."

A wrecking ball smacks into her for her stupidity, for her thoughtlessness. The signs were obvious: him knowing her name, her schedule, her sister. He had her snaked around his finger from the moment he pulled up to the street curb she stood at and it makes her eyes fill with something stronger than tears. Regret.

A high starts to storm her senses as the Johns continue to mock her and sip from their bottles. The drift happening in her head isn't that oh-so familiar whimsical wonder, though, but more one that acts as a sleeping pill. She doesn't attempt to defend herself, to leave, because what is there to go to? She'll run away from these Johns only to have to go sleep with others. Even when one man asks permission to do something vile, and this sexually sadistic wish is granted, she doesn't run—she doesn't have it in her to simply fight back. She just looks up into _his_ emotion-void eyes as she is manhandled on the bench, her clothes getting torn and her body being grabbed at.

_He_ watches a few steps behind, his hand stroking the stubble on his chin. His eyes are so glassy that she sees herself in them, sees her helpless body being invaded by one, two, three Johns. One gets atop her and starts to fumble with the belt on his slacks while the other two run their fingers along her bare skin and growl perverse glees. Everyone else cheers them on as they wait for their turn.

"Do you—"

The man on top her finally gets his pants off. Her teeth clench as she steels herself.

"—like this—"

Her hands are pinned above her head. Her eyes don't tear away from Cato. His eyes don't tear away from the rape he's about to witness.

"—you little bitch?"

She cries out in pain when the man thrusts into her. Cato smirks, the Christmas lights shining down upon him in an ironically handsome way. He watches her as she continues to sob out in agony and she stares back until she just can't anymore. She is the first to turn away and it makes her sick inside.

"Fuck, you feel," _thrust_, "so," _thrust_, "fucking,"_ spit in her face_, "_good_."

"Come on, man, we all need a turn." Someone shoves the monster penetrating her and, for a hopeful moment, the pain stops. But then it starts again as another John shoves himself inside her. They will all have their brutal chance at fucking her, at pinching her exposed nipples with all their might, at coughing their saliva on her face and telling her how tight she is, and Cato will just watch.

Her sister was right all along with her desperate warnings and angry outbursts. All the cussing and insulting she did; it was all worth something. It was worth listening to.

"Why don't you smile, babydoll?" the next rapist taunts. "You look so pretty when you smile."

With each and every thrust, a new and purplish bruise forms on her porcelain complexion. With each and every jerky movement, the John succeeds in getting deeper and deeper into her refusing body. With each and every anguished howl she lets out, Cato widens his smirk and dilates his pupils in an unhidden amusement. If she had a mind, she would wonder how something so beautiful could be so evil.

By the time he climbs on top of her, she's on the ground and bleeding—covered in spit and semen and shame. He isn't at all repulsed by the fact that he's going to get dirty, too, if he touches her. It seems to please him even more.

He takes off his suit jacket and hands it to the tall and skinny pimp. He is in no rush as he takes off his black slacks and boxers, placing them on the ground beside him in a neat pile. He looks into her eyes one final time. Then he's inside her and cursing underneath his breath—not from the guilt in what he's doing, but from the thrill it gives him, from the way it makes him feel good while at the same time makes her feel good-for-nothing. Nothing but fucking.

The first time he was inside her was a shock; he made her feel the satisfaction of sex and regular Johns never did that—they fucked without feeling and felt her up as she counted their money. The second time was no different; he made her quiver with pleasure atop his sheets and paid extra for it. The third time was one all about her, his mouth between her legs and wine in her system. They didn't fuck that time, or the few times following that, but they _made love_, imaginary hearts floating around them as they rocked into each other until the candles burned out and left them in the darkness.

This time is a horror.

He drives into her with no care, tearing her insides and making her bleed, his beer-stained breath the only thing she can smell. She wonders if this is the moment he's been waiting for since he first met her.

Perhaps it lasts for five minutes. Perhaps it lasts for five hours. All she knows is that everything hurts when he finally pulls out and puts his clothes back on; every sound, every shifting muscle, every movement out of the corner of her eyes—it's all electricity and nails along a chalkboard.

"These whores are getting dumber and dumber as the days go on ... _So we're not getting married?_" a John imitates her tone, the words pangs to her bleeding heart. "Stupid, _stupid_ bitch."

Their laughter is strong in her eardrums. She would wince if she had the energy to.

"The little slut didn't even tell us to stop; she wanted it."

They high five one another, pat each other on the back, and the noises are sonorous in her temple.

"Let's just hope that her sister's just as senseless."

Her eyes dart open as if she'd just been electrocuted.

They won't touch her sister. They can't.

Cashmere is too smart for them to corrupt nonetheless—too wise for their lies and coaxing. This is what gets Glimmer to take a relieved breath of the snow-kissed air. It burns her lungs.

_... The ground is hard and merciless beneath her bare body, the concrete creating scratches along her back. She is far too distraught to care.  
_

_All those kisses, laughs, embraces, promises, bubble baths, grilled cheese sandwiches, glasses of wine—they were all ploys for this moment of atrocity. The pretty lies; the ugly truth. She wonders if he ever felt _something_ for her, if he ever considered the fact that they could be happy together, could be each other's forever. She laughs another feeble laugh and shakes her head ever-so slightly. Who dreams about having a forever with a used and abused prostitute? She's rotten fruit, she's damaged goods, and he's a handsome aristocrat with millions to his name and pools in his eyes. She wasn't smart enough to swim._

_She wonders if heartbreak makes her look beautiful. Her careless appearance—messy, ruffled hair and eyes that shine as flat and dead as diamonds—might give her an ironically attractive aura; she could be the Queen of Disaster. _

_The snowfall becomes heavier and, in the distance, a Church choir starts _Silent Night _in depressingly angelic voices. She's dying a picturesque death._

_She wonders how many others have suffered this fate, how many others _will_ suffer this fate. She wonders if he uses all the same lines and plots and twists of his tongue. She wonders if she's, at the very least, different from the rest._

"... All is calm, all is bright ..."

_Despite her ceaseless shivering, the night is tranquil and illuminated__—not by stars, though, but by the Christmas lights hung in the trees._

"... Holy infant, so tender and mild ..."

_If she had the voice to, she'd dedicate her last words to her sister. No amount of _hold-me_s and _you-were-right_s could express the way she feels. The only thing she can do is hope that Cash doesn't make the same mistakes, waste the same sins._

"... Sleep in Heavenly peace ..."

_It hurts to even think now; the thoughts are poundings in her head. Her eyelids are suddenly heavy, too weighty for her to fight against. She's not dying. She's already dead._

"... Sleep in Heavenly peace."

_Her broken heart stops beating and a star is born in the sky._

* * *

_the epilogue;  
and you're alive again_

* * *

It's been two days since Cashmere last saw her sister. Two days, twelve Johns, and not enough cigarettes.

They haven't even exchanged Christmas presents yet.

Last year's gift swap was undeniably pathetic—she gave Glim some cotton candy-scented body spray; Glim gave her a robe from some thrift shop. The robe wasn't (and still isn't) an inferior present; it's black, comfortable, and sexy, and Cash knows that her face lit up when she first unwrapped it. It has a cigarette stench to it now, but it's still wearable. The hideously pink body spray was worthless in comparison.

But this year, Cash saved up some money to buy her younger sister a stylish Betty Boop sweatshirt and a semi-expensive curling iron. She can't wait to see her reaction to the gifts.

It's still freezing-cold on Career Avenue—the December air won't start to get warm until February rolls around—but she is wearing a short, nude-colored dress that always turns the Johns on. The older ones sometimes think that she's naked before she climbs into their cars. The soft fabric clings to her curves, begging to be torn off by greedy hands. It's going to be another rough day.

A white, polished BMW drives up to the curb just as she's pulling out another cigarette.

_Great timing_, she thinks sarcastically as she shoves the stick back into her moth-eaten handbag.

The John inside the vehicle rolls down the window as she walks toward it. His eyes—as blue as an unclouded sky—are squinted against the six o'clock sun. She leans into the window and wets her bottom lip with her tongue. She has lipstick stains on her teeth.

"What can I do for you, handsome?"

A smirk spreads across his lips. He studies her for a few moments before answering: "I've got a hotel room at the Capitol."

* * *

**Thank you so much for the plot, Zoe! I hope this lived up to your expectations (it would've been ten thousand times better if you wrote it).**

**Feedback would be lovely. **


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